Transgender students deserve to be safe at school

By Brad D. Berman

March 1, 2017

Photo: VNEWS INTERNATIONAL LLC, AFP/Getty Images

A group of protesters hold signs supporting transgender students February 25, 2017 in Chicago during a protest against the Trump administration's new guidance on transgender bathroom use in US schools. The new guidance affirms that students should use the bathroom on their birth certificate, as opposed to how they identify and present. Many transgender students say the move makes them feel unsafe using the toilets and changing areas at school. / AFP PHOTO / VNEWS International LLCVNEWS INTERNATIONAL LLC/AFP/Getty Images

A group of protesters hold signs supporting transgender students...

The Trump administration’s decision to eliminate antidiscrimination protections for transgender students in the nation’s public schools is out-and-out cruelty masquerading as education policy. It’s also an appalling step backward in our nation’s decades-long drive to create equal educational opportunities for all children.

Consider the case of Petra, a precocious 10-year-old girl I know. A fourth-grader, Petra is indistinguishable from the other students at her high-achieving suburban public school. She plays soccer, has play dates with her friends, and her parents are active in the PTA. When asked, Petra freely shares that she was born Peter. She is comfortable, safe and accepted because her school community is allowing her to be herself.

Petra’s positive experience is, sadly, not common. For young people in this country who are transgender, school is more likely than not to be an uncomfortable place where learning takes a backseat to fear — of ridicule, bullying, harassment and worse.

A young transgender man I know says: “I spent the majority of my childhood and adolescence feeling alone and believing no one in the world could understand my pain.” This young person says he was “terrified” to be himself. Now in his 20s, he says the fear of the consequences of being different made him pretend to be someone he wasn’t at school.

This young man’s fears are backed up by data showing that schools can be hostile environments for a distressing number of transgender students. According to the latest survey from the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, more than half of LGBT students (55 percent) said they were verbally harassed in the past year because of how they expressed their gender; 1 in 5 were physically harassed, and 1 in 10 were physically assaulted because of their gender expression.

Imagine living in daily fear of harassment; it is not only frightening but it also makes it hard to concentrate — and even harder to learn. And now the White House has decided to make public school an even more uncomfortable and fearful place by removing protections assuring that transgender students can use bathrooms that match the gender they know themselves to be.

The United States has evolved in its understanding of the role of our public schools in giving all students an equal opportunity to learn and succeed. First came the fight to create equal educational opportunities for African American children, who for decades were confined to inferior “Jim Crow schools.” Then, in the 1970s, the Education for All Handicapped Children Act set out to create more opportunities for children with disabilities to get the support and the education they need.

As a society, we still have a way to go to create equal educational opportunity in the public schools for all students. But it is now generally accepted that every child in this country should have a chance to attend a public school and get a decent education. And yet, we continue to misunderstand or ignore how unwelcoming and even hostile school environments can create huge barriers to learning for many children, particularly LGBT students.

The national discussion about transgender bathroom use has revolved around different themes. Is it a civil rights issue? Is it a matter of states’ rights versus federal authority? Is it about individual rights and safety versus “public comfort”? Or is it truly a matter of pursuing a conservative versus a progressive agenda for the nation?

When looked at through the eyes of Petra or any other transgender child, this issue has nothing to do with any of these larger themes. Rather, it is a simple matter of being able to go to school and feel comfortable enough with your surroundings so you can actually learn. When you consider the national consensus that schools should create a positive learning environment for all students, that’s not asking a whole lot.

Dr. Brad D. Berman is clinical professor of pediatrics at UCSF. He also is founder and principal at Progressions, a medical practice dedicated to children with diverse neurodevelopmental needs.